typography

Etymology

It is borrowed from French typographie, recorded in 1577,^[2][3][4][5] from New Latin typographia, which the OED finds in B. Veronensis in 1493.^[2][6][7] Etymonline, Barnhart and the American Heritage Dictionary call this form Medieval Latin.^[3][4][5] The Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English leave open whether English took it from French or Latin.^[8][6] It is made from Ancient Greek τύπος (túpos, “impression, type”) and -γραφία (-graphía, “writing”).^[2][4][5] The English type and -graphy come from the same elements.^[2][6] Compare Italian tipografia.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Printed matter, letterpress: 1644, in Milton's Areopagitica, the OED's first record, a sense it calls rare.^[2] The art of printing follows in 1646, in Browne's Pseudodoxia Epidemica.^[2] Barnhart has the word from 1641, in Evelyn's Diary,^[4] Etymonline from the 1640s,^[3] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged from 1610.^[9]

Semantic evolution

The adjective typographical came first, in 1593 according to Barnhart.^[4] The noun first named the art of printing as a whole, and in 1660 it briefly named a printing house.^[2] From 1697 it also meant the process of setting and printing type, and then the arrangement and look of the printed page.^[2][3] Johnson (1755) gave "the art of printing" second, after "emblematical, figurative, or hieroglyphical representation", a sense he drew from Browne's Vulgar Errours;^[10] the OED lists that sense only on Johnson's authority, as rare and obsolete.^[2] Collins now includes the selection and planning of type for publications.^[11]

Timeline

• 1644 – printed matter, letterpress (rare).^[2]
• 1646 – the art or practice of printing.^[2]
• 1660 – a printing establishment (obsolete).^[2]
• 1697 – the process of setting type and printing from it; the arrangement and appearance of printed matter.^[2][3]

Meanings

Noun

1. The art or craft of setting type and printing from it.^[11][9][2]
2. The choice and arrangement of type, and the resulting look of printed matter: The book's elegant typography makes it a pleasure to read.^[11][9][2]
3. (rare) Printed matter; letterpress.^[2]

Word family

• typographical
• typographically
• typographer
• typographic

Related words

• typology
• type
• -graphy
• topography

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ a b c Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
8. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
10. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins